The Lusiad; Or, The Discovery of India, an Epic Poem
And icy flakes incrust his shaggy hair.
Here fair Andromeda, of heav'n belov'd;
Her vengeful sire, and, by the gods reprov'd,
Beauteous Cassiope. Here, fierce and red, }
Portending storms, Orion lifts his head; }
And here the Dogs their raging fury shed. }
The Swan, sweet melodist, in death he sings,
The milder Swan here spreads his silver wings.
Here Orpheus' Lyre, the melancholy Hare,
And here the watchful Dragon's eye-balls glare;
And Theseus' ship, oh, less renown'd than thine,
Shall ever o'er these skies illustrious shine.
Beneath this radiant firmament behold
The various planets in their orbits roll'd:
Here, in cold twilight, hoary Saturn rides;
Here Jove shines mild, here fiery Mars presides;
Apollo here, enthron'd in light, appears
The eye of heav'n, emblazer of the spheres;
Beneath him beauteous glows the Queen of Love--
The proudest hearts her sacred influence prove;
Here Hermes, fam'd for eloquence divine,
And here Diana's various faces shine;
Lowest she rides, and, through the shadowy night,
Pours on the glist'ning earth her silver light.
These various orbs, behold, in various speed
Pursue the journeys at their birth decreed.
Now, from the centre far impell'd they fly,
Now, nearer earth they sail a lower sky,
A shorten'd course: Such are their laws impress'd
By God's dread will,[631] that will for ever best.
"The yellow earth, the centre of the whole,
There lordly rests sustain'd on either pole.
The limpid air enfolds in soft embrace
The pond'rous orb, and brightens o'er her face.
Here, softly floating o'er th' aërial blue,
Fringed with the purple and the golden hue,
The fleecy clouds their swelling sides display;
From whence, fermented by the sulph'rous ray,
The lightnings blaze, and heat spreads wide and rare;
And now, in fierce embrace with frozen air,
Their wombs, compress'd, soon feel parturient throws,
And white wing'd gales bear wide the teeming snows.
Thus, cold and heat their warring empires hold,
Averse yet mingling, each by each controll'd,
The highest air and ocean's bed they pierce,
And earth's dark centre feels their struggles fierce.
"The seat of man, the earth's fair breast, behold;
Here wood-crown'd islands wave their locks of gold.
Here spread wide continents their bosoms green,
And hoary Ocean heaves his breast between.
Yet, not th' inconstant ocean's furious tide
May fix the dreadful bounds of human pride.
What madd'ning seas between these nations roar!
Yet Lusus' hero-race shall visit ev'ry shore.
What thousand tribes, whom various customs sway,
And various rites, these countless shores display!
Queen of the world, supreme in shining arms,
Hers ev'ry art, and hers all wisdom's charms,
Each nation's tribute round her foot-stool spread,
Here Christian Europe[632] lifts the regal head.
Afric behold,[633] alas, what alter'd view!
Her lands uncultur'd, and her son's untrue;
Ungraced with all that sweetens human life,
Savage and fierce they roam in brutal strife;
Eager they grasp the gifts which culture yields,
Yet, naked roam their own neglected fields.
Lo, here enrich'd with hills of golden ore,
Monomotapa's empire hems the shore.
There round the Cape, great Afric's dreadful bound,
Array'd in storms (by you first compass'd round),
Unnumber'd tribes as bestial grazers stray,
By laws unform'd, unform'd by reason's sway:
Far inward stretch the mournful sterile dales,
Where, on the parch'd hill-side, pale Famine wails.
On gold in vain the naked savage treads;
Low, clay-built huts, behold, and reedy sheds,
Their dreary towns. Gonzalo's zeal shall glow[634]
To these dark minds the path of light to show:
His toils to humanize the barb'rous mind
Shall, with the martyr's palms, his holy temples bind.
Great Naya,[635] too, shall glorious here display
His God's dread might: behold, in black array,
Num'rous and thick as when in evil hour
The feather'd race whole harvest fields devour,
So thick, so num'rous round Sofála's towers
Her barb'rous hordes remotest Africa pours:
In vain; Heav'n's vengeance on their souls impress'd,
They fly, wide scatter'd as the driving mist.
Lo, Quama there, and there the fertile Nile
Curs'd with that gorging fiend, the crocodile,
Wind their long way: the parent lake behold,
Great Nilus' fount, unseen, unknown of old,
From whence, diffusing plenty as he glides,
Wide Abyssinia's realm the stream divides.
In Abyssinia Heav'n's own altars blaze,[636]
And hallow'd anthems chant Messiah's praise.
In Nile's wide breast the isle of M{)e}r{)o}{=e} see!
Near these rude shores a hero sprung from thee,
Thy son, brave GAMA,[637] shall his lineage show
In glorious triumphs o'er the paynim[638] foe.
There by the rapid Ob her friendly breast
Melinda spreads, thy place of grateful rest.
Cape Aromata there the gulf defends,
Where by the Red Sea wave great Afric ends.
Illustrious Suez, seat of heroes old,
Fam'd Hierapolis, high-tower'd, behold.
Here Egypt's shelter'd fleets at anchor ride,
And hence, in squadrons, sweep the eastern tide.
And lo, the waves that aw'd by Moses' rod,
While the dry bottom Israel's armies trod,
On either hand roll'd back their frothy might,
And stood, like hoary rocks, in cloudy height.
Here Asia, rich in ev'ry precious mine,
In realms immense, begins her western line.
Sinai behold, whose trembling cliffs of yore
In fire and darkness, deep pavilion'd, bore
The Hebrews' God, while day, with awful brow,
Gleam'd pale on Israel's wand'ring tents below.
The pilgrim now the lonely hill ascends,
And, when the ev'ning raven homeward bends,
Before the virgin-martyr's tomb[639] he pays
His mournful vespers, and his vows of praise.
Jidda behold, and Aden's parch'd domain
Girt by Arzira's rock, where never rain
Yet fell from heav'n; where never from the dale
The crystal riv'let murmur'd to the vale.
The three Arabias here their breasts unfold,
Here breathing incense, here a rocky wold;
O'er Dofar's plain the richest incense breathes,
That round the sacred shrine its vapour wreathes;
Here the proud war-steed glories in his force,
As, fleeter than the gale, he holds the course.
Here, with his spouse and household lodg'd in wains,
The Arab's camp shifts, wand'ring o'er the plains,
The merchant's dread, what time from eastern soil
His burthen'd camels seek the land of Nile.
Here Rosalgate and Farthac stretch their arms,
And point to Ormuz, fam'd for war's alarms;
Ormuz, decreed full oft to quake with dread
Beneath the Lusian heroes' hostile tread,
Shall see the Turkish moons,[640] with slaughter gor'd,
Shrink from the lightning of De Branco's sword.[641]
There on the gulf that laves the Persian shore,
Far through the surges bends Cape Asabore.
There Barem's isle;[642] her rocks with diamonds blaze,
And emulate Aurora's glitt'ring rays.
From Barem's shore Euphrates' flood is seen,
And Tigris' waters, through the waves of green
In yellowy currents many a league extend,
As with the darker waves averse they blend.
Lo, Persia there her empire wide unfolds!
In tented camp his state the monarch holds:
Her warrior sons disdain the arms of fire,[643]
And, with the pointed steel, to fame aspire;
Their springy shoulders stretching to the blow,
Their sweepy sabres hew the shrieking foe.
There Gerum's isle the hoary ruin wears
Where Time has trod:[644] there shall the dreadful spears
Of Sousa and Menezes strew the shore
With Persian sabres, and embathe with gore.
Carpella's cape, and sad Carmania's strand,
There, parch'd and bare, their dreary wastes expand.
A fairer landscape here delights the view;
From these green hills beneath the clouds of blue,
The Indus and the Ganges roll the wave,
And many a smiling field propitious lave.
Luxurious here, Ulcinda's harvests smile,
And here, disdainful of the seaman's toil,
The whirling tides of Jaquet furious roar;
Alike their rage when swelling to the shore,
Or, tumbling backward to the deep, they force
The boiling fury of their gulfy course:
Against their headlong rage nor oars nor sails,
The stemming prow alone, hard toil'd, prevails.
Cambaya here begins her wide domain;
A thousand cities here shall own the reign
Of Lisboa's monarchs. He who first shall crown
Thy labours, GAMA,[645] here shall boast his own.
The length'ning sea that washes India's strand
And laves the cape that points to Ceylon's land
(The Taprobanian isle,[646] renown'd of yore),
Shall see his ensigns blaze from shore to shore.
Behold how many a realm, array'd in green,
The Ganges' shore and Indus' bank between!
Here tribes unnumber'd, and of various lore,
With woful penance fiend-like shapes adore;
Some Macon's orgies;[647] all confess the sway
Of rites that shun, like trembling ghosts, the day.
Narsinga's fair domain behold; of yore
Here shone the gilded towers of Meliapore.
Here India's angels, weeping o'er the tomb
Where Thomas sleeps,[648] implore the day to come,
The day foretold, when India's utmost shore
Again shall hear Messiah's blissful lore.
By Indus' banks the holy prophet trod,
And Ganges heard him preach the Saviour-God;
Where pale disease erewhile the cheek consum'd,
Health, at his word, in ruddy fragrance bloom'd;
The grave's dark womb his awful voice obey'd,
And to the cheerful day restor'd the dead;
By heavenly power he rear'd the sacred shrine,
And gain'd the nations by his life divine.
The priests of Brahma's hidden rites beheld,
And envy's bitt'rest gall their bosom's swell'd.
A thousand deathful snares in vain they spread;
When now the chief who wore the triple thread,[649]
Fir'd by the rage that gnaws the conscious breast
Of holy fraud, when worth shines forth confess'd,
Hell he invokes, nor hell in vain he sues;
His son's life-gore his wither'd hands imbrues;
Then, bold assuming the vindictive ire,
And all the passions of the woful sire,
Weeping, he bends before the Indian throne,
Arraigns the holy man, and wails his son:
A band of hoary priests attest the deed,
And India's king condemns the seer to bleed.
Inspir'd by Heav'n the holy victim stands,
And o'er the murder'd corse extends his hands:
'In God's dread power, thou slaughter'd youth, arise,
And name,thy murderer,' aloud he cries.
When, dread to view, the deep wounds instant close,
And, fresh in life, the slaughter'd youth arose,
And nam'd his treach'rous sire. The conscious air
Quiver'd, and awful horror raised the hair
On ev'ry head. From Thomas India's king
The holy sprinkling of the living spring
Receives, and wide o'er all his regal bounds
The God of Thomas ev'ry tongue resounds.
Long taught the holy seer the words of life;
The priests of Brahma still to deeds of strife
(So boil'd their ire) the blinded herd impell'd,
And high, to deathful rage, their rancour swell'd.
'Twas on a day, when melting on his tongue
Heav'n's offer'd mercies glow'd, the impious throng,
Rising in madd'ning tempest, round him shower'd
The splinter'd flint; in vain the flint was pour'd: